


Love, Undeserved and Unearned

by Ilavenil



Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 04:33:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8564200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilavenil/pseuds/Ilavenil
Summary: A new nurse learns a lesson in loving others.





	

Emma stood in the nurses station for the first time. She was a brand-new nurse, her uniform starched and ironed, her cap neatly pinned over her hair which was set to perfection. Her supervisor, Pamela Smith, asked. “Emma Jones?”

“Yes, Ma’am.” Emma answered.

“I don’t know what you learnt in nursing college. I don’t want to know. Here, you do everything as I say, understand? This register is for supplies. This one is for drugs administered, and you better not touch anything on that shelf..” Why was this woman so rude?

The next day Pamela came to Emma while she was carrying a tray of supplies. “Your rounds today are complete? Where are your notes?”

“Ma’am, I just thought I’d complete it after-” Emma started, but couldn’t complete the sentence. Pamela screamed at her, in front of her colleagues, the patients and the attendants. A tear rolled down her cheek. “Done being a drama queen? Now how about you actually do some work?”

Emma soon found that this was normal. Pamela was the best nurse in the hospital, but she yelled at patients, their attendants, and one day, she waved a writing pad in a senior doctor’s face. “If you write in this sort of handwriting, what are we supposed to do?

After yet another conflict, Emma was flipping through a magazine one day when she read a quote “Love me when I have earned it the least. Because then, I need it most.” Emma thought. Was that true? What about people like Pamela, who only radiated hate?

The next day, Emma took out a pile of notes which Pamela had marked over in red ink, and looked at the mistakes. They were minor, but if there were too many errors, the patient would suffer. She meticulously wrote that day’s notes, to which Pamela said, “Adequate work, at last. Now, don’t think you’re perfect.”

When Pamela screamed at a patient’s attendant, Emma actually listened to the words instead of the volume. Pamela had found peanuts in the food the attendant had bought. It would have caused a near-fatal allergic reaction. Emma herself started looking over the food attendants bought to their ward. So many of them had neglected dietary warnings.

One night, when she and Pamela were the only nurses in the ward, Emma walked up to Pamela with a little notebook. She had waited for a time when Pamela would be alone, and in the night, she would not shout. She left it on her desk, and moved away.

Soon, Pamela came up to Emma and waved the notebook in her face. “What is this girl? A list of the people I scream at?”

Emma said. “Ma’am, those are the lives you saved, all in the last month. There are 200.”

Pamela took a step back and looked at the notebook. Emma had written down a person’s name, the problem, and what could have happened if Pamela hadn’t spotted it. “What is this? Flattery? You think it’s going to help you?”

“No Ma’am, I know it will not.” Emma answered. 

“You do your job, don’t try to track me. Do you know, the day I became a nurse? I was just like you. Thought I knew everything. And then, I mixed up medicines, and a patient died. Do you want that to happen to you, girl? Get back to work!” She walked off.

Emma was stunned. Had Pamela ever shared that with anybody? Such a huge bombshell, dropped so abruptly? But from the next day, Pamela became the sweetest person you could ever see. She was so kind to everyone, that when a new nurse joined, she actually hugged the girl.

It would be a fairy tale if that happened. But, Pamela didn’t change. The next week, Pamela yelled at Emma "You bribed and flattered your way through college, good for nothing girl!" for spelling a medicine wrong. She screamed more abuse for the whole ward to see. And in front of her eyes, Emma corrected it and made another entry in the “lives saved" notebook. Pamela huffed and went back to her work.

Emma soon escaped Pamela's ire. She was chosen for a coveted internship in the biggest teaching hospital in her state. Emma thought that fate had smiled on her. Or was it Karma? However, one of her new supervisors looked over her notes, and said. "I was surprised when Pamela Smith recommended an intern for the first time in 20 years. She was right, you do pay attention to detail.” Emma was glad that she had shown love to someone who seemed to spew hate. Pamela had given back her love in her own way.


End file.
